Oh my lord.
I love you all, thanks so much for the reviews.
This chapter is okay, I just needed it really to get from one point to another.
Anyways, Reviews are lovely, so are prompts or things that should happen in the story.
Peace&Love
Intruder in the flat. Come if you want, Sherlock's hurt. - JW
Mycroft stares at the text message, that he received some twenty minutes ago, in the back of his speeding sedan. Greg, who happened to be with Mycroft at the time, sits next to him, looking at his similar text message from John.
The black sedan screeches to a stop in front of Baker Street.
"John what did you do?"
John quickly glances over at his shoulder at the dead man on the floor. John doesn't feel anything, he should feel regret at the dead man, he should feel fear and panic at how the man came to be dead, he should be freaking out. Instead, the doctor feels nothing, his thoughts focused solely on the bleeding detective in front of him.
"Sherlock are you hurt anywhere else?" John asks, in full doctor mode, ignoring the detective's question. He runs a hand over the roped genius.
Sherlock tries to shake his head but winces in pain.
"Just my head and shoulder." Sherlock thoughts claim, his tone subdued and listening, making John's panic grow. The detective never makes things easy. John dashes up from the sofa and runs to the kitchen, he fetches a towel, his medical bag is upstairs and Mycroft would be there soon followed by an ambulance. If John can keep pressure on the wound, Sherlock should last until the paramedics get here.
Should.
"Will. Sherlock will make it." John yells at himself.
After he grabs the towel, he runs over to the mantle, yanking the pen knife out of the ornate wood, letters and bills scattering the floor with the draft of John rushing by.
He runs back to the genius, cutting the ropes fast but gently, slashing the constricting tendrils of Moriarty.
"Sherlock, you got to stay with me okay. Keep talking." John shouts at the detective, the last of the ropes falling away from the younger man. The genius, goes limp and starts listing sideways. John grabs a hold of him gently and guides him down to the sofa. Sherlock's eyes are closed still and his breathing is ragged. "Sherlock." John's voice is full of panic and concern, but his hands are still and his mind clear.
"Ow." Sherlock's thoughts are fuzzy and dry, the detective is trying not to display how much his body, his transport, is actually hurting him.
Without hesitation, John presses the towel onto Sherlock's shoulder. Sherlock jolts, his face twisting in pain and his eyes bursting open with a gasp of pain.
"This is what it feels like to get shot." John snorts, brushing curls off the detective's sweating forehead.
"Welcome to the club." He says dryly, checking Sherlock's vitals and pulse. The warmth of lilac and honey fading in and out as John makes and breaks links as he moves around the detective's body. John watches as Sherlock closes his eyes again, the pain coursing through him. John delves into the detective's unguarded thoughts, in too much pain to silence himself. John accesses Sherlock's pain level through his thoughts. John almost cries out in pain once he feels Sherlock's pain. "Talk about sympathy pains." John thinks darkly.
"Sherlock." John expels sadly, grabbing the man's hand. The connection opens instantly and the feelings of lilac and honey come back, this time distant and dull. John instantly seeps with worry. Sherlock is always dramatic and vibrant, nothing in the genius's head is meant to be dull. He squeezes Sherlock's hand, trying to dispel feelings of safety, calm and warmth. John sees the detective's body relax a fraction.
"Are you doing that?" Sherlock asks out loud, in gasps.
"Shh..don't talk." John soothes, the kitchen towel now soaked with blood, John's hand beginning to stain.
"Fine, Mother hen. Are you doing that?" Sherlock thoughts shout impatiently.
"Did it work?" John asks, amazed at a new aspect of his ability despite the situation.
"I feel calm and safe." Sherlock tries to push a memory out but halfway through gives up, his pain distracting him. "I didn't know you could do that. What else..."
"Another time, when you aren't bleeding to death on the sofa maybe." John says frantically, pushing harder onto the detective's shoulder. Angry tears threatening to spill, as the blood seeps through his fingers, the life literally weeping out of Sherlock.
Lestrade is the first one out of the sedan and up the stairs, Mycroft follows behind him with agile astuteness.
Lestrade and Mycroft freeze in the doorjamb of the sitting room.
Mycroft notices everything right away. Masked intruder, dead, no visible wounds, wrestled on the floor with John probably. Drops of blood around the sofa, Sherlock, bleeding shot and possible concussion.
Lestrade only sees the blood and his training kicks in. "Bloody hell." Lestrade exclaims, rushing over to the doctor, his face stricken and confused.
"Ambulance is on it's way." Mycroft states, staying at the doorway, if it was anyone other than Mycroft, John would assume that the politician is frozen in shock. John sighs in relief.
"He's losing a lot of blood." Lestrade states, his hands ghosting over the thin man, uncertainty clouding his thoughts.
Sherlock's eyes close again, his breathing because even more laboured.
"Sherlock stay with me, keep talking." John encourages, gripping the genius's hand tighter.
"Fine, what shall I talk about?" The detective thoughts are jumbled and getting weaker. John has to resist the urge to answer the detective. The doctor's response may go unnoticed by Lestrade, but definitely not Mycroft.
John forces himself into Sherlock's mind, bringing up happy memories that the detective has shown John before. He only has to bring up two memories before Sherlock takes over, showing John his favorites memories. John watches the thoughts in his head idly, silent tears falling, the memories surprisingly comfort the doctor. Not to mention the fact that if Sherlock can control the memories that John sees, it means he is still coherent and alive.
He pushes down on Sherlock's shoulder and squeezes the detective hand, everything silent, until the front door burst open and the paramedics rush in.
John doesn't realises how silent the flat is until the bustling of paramedics enters the sitting room, almost hurting the doctor's ears. The doctor moves out of the way quickly, giving Sherlock's hand one more squeeze before breaking contact.
"John."
He hovers over the paramedics not really watching what they are doing, instead listening to Sherlock's thoughts.
"Dull, I hate hospitals." Weak phrases would come to the forefront of Sherlock's mind in between fading memories. John can tell the detective is going to lose consciousness soon, he tries to send waves of cold, yet comforting feelings to keep the detective awake. For a millisecond, John smugly sees a shiver run through the detective's body.
"John." The thought is full of pain and panic. John's heart breaks.
One second, that's all the time it takes for John's entire world comes crashing down, stopping in it's revolve. The connection goes suddenly silent, stopping mid-thought and the connection severs. John gasps harshly, forcing himself not to react to the pain in his head. Instead, he focuses on the senses of lilac and honey leaving the doctor and John's eyes grow wide in alarm. John scans the genius, his face is lax and his eyes are shut, not tightly out of pain. The hairs on the back of John's neck stand up, something is wrong.
"Sherlock!" John screams and dashes over to the detective to find his pulse, no connection happens, no bouts of warmth and lilac/honey. The paramedics are startled by the short man, screaming at them, the haven't any time to react to Sherlock's cardiac arrest. John's head explodes and he can feel the nose bleed, the doctor has never been connected with someone who has died on the spot.
"There is no pulse!" John screams at the paramedics, about to push them out of his way when strong arms grab the soldier around the waist. John fights against the stronghold trying to get back to the detective. His head pulsating and his arms flailing.
"John, calm down. They are doing CPR right now." He vaguely hears Lestrade over his own screaming. John watches in horror, writhing underneath the DI's grip and repeating the detective's name over and over again.
One Second, that's all the time it takes for John's world to start up once again. A struggling breath escapes Sherlock's lips. John stops struggling and concentrates, his face wet with tears and blood from when the intruder backhanded him. He searches for lilac and honey, the senses are distant but John latches on with full force. Sherlock's thoughts are jumbled and repeating words, mostly John's name but nothing makes sense.
"Sherlock." John calls out softly, the grip around his waist tightening, John watches horrified as the paramedics load the detective on the stretcher and away.
John sits on the hospital chairs. He doesn't feel anything. The doctor's legs are curled against his chest, his arms wrapped tightly around his knees uncomfortably, the blood soaked shirt sticking to him, mixed with Sherlock blood and the blood from John's torrential nose bleed. John stays in this position despite the ache in his leg and his shoulder.
Sherlock has been in surgery for four hours and John is losing his patience. He remembers storming into the hospital, a whirlwind of emotions and demands, Lestrade and Mycroft trailing behind him. He terrorized nurses and doctors demanding that someone inform him of the detective's condition. His temper tantrum would have put any of Sherlock's fits to shame. Eventually, Mycroft and Lestrade rallied the apoplectic doctor into a hospital chair to talk sense in him and have someone look him over. It took both men to calm the doctor down enough to allow a nurse to treat his bruised face and bloodied face. Finally, Lestrade and Mycroft were able to calm the doctor's thoughts and make him see reason. John instantly apologised for his behavior and instantly went silent and remained that way while he waited.
Mycroft left first, he received a very heated call. By the time he announced he had to leave for a short while, his face was red with frustration and irritation.
Lestrade left next, in quite a similar manner. He also got a call, this time from Sally, he had to go back to Baker Street. His reasons were vague and John didn't care enough to read his thoughts.
In fact, he barely remembers either of them leaving. He is just sitting staring at the wall opposite, arms wrapped tightly around his knees, shielding him from bad news, protecting him from the extreme and sad possibilities. John sits there scanning the entire hospital, looking for lilac and honey. One time, he got the faintest hint of lilac and latched on immediately only to realise seconds later that it was a nurse on the third floor. John held the connection for a little bit, he has never done this before, blindly finding and following an unfamiliar connection. John probes the naive nurse seeing how far he can dive into her thoughts.
After a while, John gets bored and breaks the connection, the nurse offered a welcome distraction but John just wants to hear, feel, see, hold Sherlock. He buries his head further into his knees, his eyes long dried up from the constant tears, but he can feels his eyes welling again. He tries to blink back his tears as he waits.
The sound of a door creaking open registers in John's mind, but he doesn't lift his head to see who came through the doors, his own despair and exhaustion clouding his judgement.
"Sherlock Holmes?" A confident voice calls out. John immediately jumps to his feet and looks at the doctor. His eyes are a muddy brown, while his hair is graying. He is easily into his early forties and his face is kind and confident. Probably been a doctor for ten years or more.
"How is he?" John doesn't bother with formalities. His mind is already going through the man's face and the man's thoughts. He purposefully breaks one of his rules and invades the man's mind without hesitation. He sees an image of himself, haggard, blood soaked and dried in the doctor's shirt. John listens for news of Sherlock. Why isn't this doctor think about his patient? Why is he thinking about something else?
"Are you family?" John senses the suspicion in the doctor's thoughts. John resist his frustration and the urge to scream at the doctor until his voice is hoarse.
"I'm Dr. John Watson, I'm his doctor, his brother, Mycroft, left me to tend to him." John remarks, his voice angry and snippy.
"Okay, well, the bullet was a through and through, missing most of the important stuff. We were mostly worried about blood loss, but we gave him three blood transfusions and his vitals are looking good. It'll be touch and go for a while and he is still unconscious due to the morphine. He will be in a lot of pain for the next forty eight hours, but after that he should be able to go home and rest there." John sees the images of Sherlock as the man relays the information. An image of Sherlock lying motionless on a gurney. The image of the detective losing blood.
John breaks the mental connection suddenly, not wanting to see more. Tears are streaking down his face, thankfully the doctor looks at John with sympathetic eyes, assuming that John is emotional about the new information.
"When can I see him?" John questions in a huff. The doctor only looks at him sternly but gently.
"I would recommend coming back tomorrow, when Mr. Holmes has gotten settled into his room. Visiting hours are almost over."
No way in hell is John waiting until tomorrow.
"Thank you doctor," John states after a couple of seconds, offering his hand out to the man and they shake hands. In the split second, the contact gives John the ability to explore the man's thoughts, beside his affair with his intern John found out Sherlock's room number.
After their handshake breaks, the doctor leaves. John, being a doctor, knows St. Barts like the back of his hand. He immediately leaves the waiting room and takes a long but successfully ninja-like route to Sherlock's room.
John finds the room.
221. Fitting.
John scans the darken hallway for nurses and sees none, he opens his mental connections in search for nearby thoughts, nothing shows up on either external or mental scan. The doctor slowly opens the door and enters the room, making as little noise as possible.
John lets his self-control loose and flings himself to the detective's bedside. The younger man is gaunt and exhaustion is clear on his face, but his features are slack and peaceful.
"Probably the most sleep he has had in days." John thinks to himself.
He hesitantly reaches his hand out, letting it hover undecided over the detective's skin. John chooses to gently take Sherlock's hand. The connection opens up with colors, just like when the detective is dreaming. Red is the prominent color this time, John has to resist the urge to throw up when he realises that the red is blood. It's crimson branches taking over Sherlock's unconsciousness.
John tries to look underneath the red for the memory that is hidden, like he normally does when Sherlock sleeps. Instead, the memories all mush into one and run rapidly throughout John's mind, none of them stopping long enough for John to comprehend. John senses the fear and pain that the detective is fearing in his dream.
John pushes soothing warmth and thoughts of safety into Sherlock's thoughts. He sits on the chair next to the detective's bed, conveying the comforting thoughts, feelings, sentiment, hoping that the genius will calm, not really sure if it will work, he is at least trying, this aspect is a little new to him.
He never, in his entire life, thought that he would be able to transfer any part of his gift to another person, especially feelings. In that moment, John makes a decision, when, yes when, not if, Sherlock wakes up, the doctor will gladly let the man do any experiment he wants and the doctor will not complain or try to sabotage the results.
John notices the detective's thoughts calming down and the memories flashing slower. John watches some of the images for a while, his head laying on Sherlock's hand, after a while he just closes his eyes reveling in the comfort of the alive man in front of him, falling asleep in the warmth of lilac and honey.
Sherlock knows he isn't awake, he knows that he is unconscious, but in a different level of wakefulness than previously, he can't feel his physical body but he is aware of his surroundings. He mind momentarily panics and Sherlock tries to move. Instead, he calms as he feels warmth, safety, comfort, love, tenderness and a base line of anxiety filter in his thoughts. He tries to find purchase on his own memories, trying to control them and bring them to surface, to comfort the anxious John.
He knows John is the reason for these feelings, but he can't seem to find his own memories as to why he knows this. For a minute, Sherlock thoughts scream in alarm, he panics that maybe he forgot who he is. He dives deeper and soon realisies that he has memories, he just can't control them and bring them to the forefront. Pain, panic and the longing to get back to John are his priorities and he can't seem to drop them in a chance to comfort himself through his memories.
The detective hopes John won't be mad that he couldn't comfort the doctor, that he is too weak to control his memories.
With that thought Sherlock falls into a fitful slumber.
John's shoulder and neck are stiff from the position he feel asleep in. He doesn't move, instead grips the lean fingers in his hand tighter, reassuringly. John lets his forehead lay on the cool fingers a little while longer as he again, tries to find the memories of Sherlock. The colors are gone and John feels Sherlock presence more.
A wave of panic flashes through John. John's head snaps up and looks directly into the detective's face. Sherlock's face is slack like before, no evidence of pain.
John focuses more on the thoughts of the genius. He can feel Sherlock calm down on his own, but he sends more feelings towards the detective, not able to forgo his own anxiety. John stands up, his leg protesting, John ignores it and moves closer to the bed, running his other hand in Sherlock's dark curls.
John finds no memories in Sherlock, he feels the panic and alarm that Sherlock is feeling presently but no images.
Suddenly, Sherlock's connection becomes vibrant with coloring, the man falling asleep again.
John sighs in resignation and waits more.
"Okay Sherlock. Now it's time to wake up." John whispers into the detective ear.
The night passed uneventfully, John had fallen asleep again and was woken up by a nurse checking on Sherlock. The doctor looked at her menacingly. He was told he could stay and his expression changed instantly, flashing her a sheepish smile.
Now John is bored. "I need to stop being around Sherlock." John thinks to himself.
He wants to talk to Sherlock, he wants to see the icy gray eyes of the detective. John misses the genius and his ego.
John strokes the top of Sherlock's hand, looking in the detective's thoughts. He is in a lighter level of wakefulness at the moment, feelings and the occasion of image flash though the detective's mind. John is tempted to dive into his thoughts and force him out of his slumber, but resist the urge for fear of causing more damage, especially because of the concussion.
A pang of longing hits John straight in his chest, almost falling backward because of the sudden burst of emotion coming from the detective.
"Sherlock. Wake UP!" John practically screams. Sherlock's eyes flutter and his thoughts become more alert.
"John."
"Yes, that's right Sherlock. Open those eyes." John soothes, images start to fuzz in and out of the detective's mind.
"John." Sherlock thoughts puff out. Within a minute, the detective's eyes are fluttering, John is leaning over the genius body, his free hand cupping the younger man's face.
Icy gray orbs find John, slightly unfocused and blurred.
"Sherlock." John lets out the breath he didn't know he was holding.
"John." His voice is raspy from disuse but John enjoys the deep baritone. He embraces the detective gingerly, not willing to let go...ever.
Oh and by the way, shameless self-promoting. I wrote the most tragic fic the other day, you should read it. Love is Temporary Madness.
Be prepared with ice cream and tissues.